Goodbye Kiwi

This post has nothing to do with food. So i apologize for that.  I will post some of my newest creations tomorrow.


I write this post with a heavy heart. Two days after I put up my last post and we celebrated five years of having Kiwi he was suddenly taken away from us.  Like I mentioned before we have always let Kiwi have his flying wings and ever since we have been in MA he had a normal flight path from the dining room where his cage was to the kitchen, where he would normally fly right to either David's or my shoulder.  


On Saturday we had only left the dining room for a mere second. We heard Kiwi scream and we ran over.  Kiwi had landed on my parent's parrot's (Baby) cage. Baby had mortally bit Kiwi. We rushed him to the animal emergency hospital but they confirmed what we already knew deep down inside: there was nothing they could do.  We were devastated.


The sudden shock of this violent death of our beloved bird has been very difficult for us.  Kiwi was unlike your normal bird.  He was trained.  He could do tricks, and even was poop potty trained (if thats what you call it for birds). He was always on our shoulder whenever we were home.  We always left the cage open so he could fly to us.  He loved for me to hold him close to my chest and scratch his head.  When I scratched his head he would close his eyes and just rest with me. He would cry for us whenever we left the room.  He liked to snuggle against my neck or inside my bathrobe when he was cold... Like I said. Not your normal bird.  


We loved him very much, and he very much became a part of our family.  Even if you don't like birds you can understand if you imagine your pet suddenly died in a violent way.  Green Cheek Conures can live up to 25 years of age.  We were expecting Kiwi to meet all of our potential kids and be a part of our family for a long time.  Kiwi has been such a constant part of our lives.  In the past five years we have moved to four different states, had different jobs, Eliana was born, I started grad school... Throughout all those years we always had him.  I have never had to do a paper for school without him on my shoulder and his death has really shown me how much he really meant to us.


It was such a freak accident and it is such a complicated situation since Baby is also a part of my family.  My parents got Baby before I was even born. So this situation is very delicate, complex and layered.  It has been a very difficult weekend for us and I know it will take time for us to feel better. I know I will have to get used to the silence.  It has been very quiet since Kiwi is now gone.  He was always chirping in our ears since he loved to snuggle on our necks, next to our ears.  He also loved to "talk" exactly when we were talking... I miss that.. :'(


Hope is the thing with feathers 
That perches in the soul, 
And sings the tune without words, 
And never stops at all. 
Emily Dickinson


RIP Kiwi 06/01/2006- 11/19/2011

Meet Kiwi, our Green Cheek Conure

So five years today my husband David and I got a bird. It was the cutest bird in the pet store.. for days I would just go to the store and play with him through the glass. I looked up all the information I could get on Green Cheek Conures (GCC) and I learned everything there was to know. I even named him before we bought him (oops?). I named him Kiwi. And apparently that is what made my husband make up his mind to get him. So I guess lesson learned? Name the animal you want and your family members will want to get it for you ;) 


All kidding aside I love my Kiwi.  He loves for me to scratch his head, he cries when we leave the room, he loves to sit on my shoulder or to hide in my bathrobe when it is cold, he repeatedly says "I want some" whenever I am eating, regardless of what it is and he LOVES to shower in the sink (he'll shower in the shower too but he prefers the sink!)  All in all he has been such a wonderful bird who is playful, cute, and really not high maintenance (unless you consider the fact that you can't do dishes without him flying over to you and trying to jump into the sink high maintenance lol).  We decided to let his feathers grow so that he can fly.  And he actually has learned to figure out which room in the house we are in and can fly to us and land on our shoulder which can catch you by surprise if you didn't remember you left the cage open! 


This is a picture of Kiwi the day we got him (11/17/2006)

5 month old Kiwi

Kiwi was born in June of 2006.  My husband and I had just gotten married that June.  So of course I thought Kiwi was destined to be ours! Now Kiwi is 5 and my husband and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary this past June. This is my most current picture of Kiwi. This is also Kiwi's way of telling me "I want a shower!" He flew to the kitchen sink faucet:

5 year old Kiwi

Alright enough about my bird ;) Now onto food! In June I decided to make a cool lunch for Eliana to celebrate Kiwi's birthday. Sorry for the poor quality in advance.  It was taken with my phone and it was dark that day! 

Happy 5th Birthday Kiwi! :)

I made the parrot sandwich out of a spinach tortilla filled with ham and cheese cut with a parrot cookie cutter.  I cut some of the beak out the spinach tortilla and use a food safe marker to color the cheese underneath to make it look like a beak. For the maroon colored belly I cut out the shape with fruit leather.


The "perch" is a bread crust


The cupcake was cheese that I cut with a small cookie cutter and then decorated it with food safe markers.


"Kiwi" was cut out with cheese with alphabet cutters


I added some raspberries and blueberries for the border


This lunch was fun to do and Eliana loved it! Next time I try to make a sandwich like Kiwi I may want to try to add more colorful tail feathers, but for a first try I was really happy with it.

Flower Soup

Eliana has been sick since last Saturday...needless to say we have been exhausted over here..  Sleepless nights, interrupted sleep, runny nose, cough along with a side of being irritable and not wanting to eat.  It is never fun when your little one comes down with a cold.  I'm so thankful Eliana likes soup! Since she hasn't been eating as well soup is great way to get some good nutrition in.  However having soup every day for lunch can get boring.. so I decided to present today's soup in a creative way: as a muffin tin meal!

Flower Soup

Eliana actually asked for soup and cracker refills and told me she likes her soup better in the flowers than in bowls! This was a very simple lunch, but very creative! 


I put her chicken noodle soup in two flower silicone cups  [use homemade soup or canned...  if you happen to be running on a week of not-so-good sleep I would go with canned ;) ]


I then put crackers in the last flower silicone cup.  I also cut some green peppers for some "leaves".

Easy as pie. Or soup.

Jack-o-lantern Pumpkin Pancakes

Jack-o-lantern Pumpkin Shaped Pancakes!

The other day I decided to make some pumpkin pancakes. I was going to put actual pumpkin puree in them, but I didn't have any... so I settled with Jack-o-lantern pumpkin shaped pancakes! I think he's kinda cute! What do you think?

To make these pumpkin pancakes:
First you make your favorite pancake mix, whether it is homemade or box (You do have to make sure there are no clumps so make sure the batter is completely smooth)  


Separate the batter into different bowls and add food coloring (I added cocoa powder to make brown).  


Pour the batter into separate squeeze bottles.  


Then draw your design out on your frying pan or griddle! (Remember it will need to be flipped over so you whatever you draw make sure it looks good backwards too!)


You need to make sure the heat is low so that it cooks nice and slow and doesn't burn your design. Start by drawing the outline of the pumpkin first, and then draw the inside eyes, nose and mouth.  Let it cook until almost fully cooked.  Then fill in the pumpkin with the rest of the orange batter.  Let the inside cook until fully cooked.  Then flip it over ever so gently and cook the other side.  I made the leaf and pumpkin stem separately because I thought it would be easier that way.


Once you get the hang of this it is not that complicated and the designs are endless! And of course, next time if I am making pumpkin shaped pancakes I will have to make sure we have pumpkin puree in the house! :)

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Easy Leaf Lunch

To celebrate all things fall and the falling of the leaves we made this super Easy Leaf Lunch:

I made a grilled cheese sandwich and cut it with a leaf cookie cutter. I then cut the apple (freshly picked!) and the organic fruit leather with a mini leaf cookie cutter.

And that's it! Simple as that! 

You could always add decorations to the leaf on the top (make leaf veins), or make the grilled cheese with added vegetables inside. I went the simple route this time and just did a simple grilled cheese. Maybe next time I will add sliced carrots or sliced ham inside :)

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Hungry Squirrel

This cute Hungry Squirrel is gathering acorns!

I'm all about using what you have in your kitchen... and well we had a lot of colored bell peppers so I figured I would make another fall inspired lunch for Eliana :) He looks hard to make but really didn't take much time :)


The Squirrel is a jelly sandwich cut with a squirrel cookie cutter.  For the tail I put some Nutella on the top and used a toothpick to add some texture. An edible candy eye and a chocolate sprinkle mouth add simple final touches :)


The branches of the tree are pretzel rods and pretzel sticks.


The leaves are cut red and orange bell peppers, cheese and sun dried basil tomato tortillas.


The acorns are dark chocolate Hershey kisses, Mini Nilla wafers and peanut butter chips (all "glued" together with peanut butter. Eliana wouldn't eat the acorns but they were super cute!)  I got this cute acorn idea here.


This lunch was loved by Eliana and it was fun to make :) It also worked as a great way to explain how squirrels gather acorns for the winter! :)

**Peanut and Nut Free options**
We officially learned that Eliana is allergic to peanuts and nuts (after this was made, in summer of 2012).  She previously had never eaten them because she never liked peanut butter or nuts. But now that we are aware of the actual allergy, not just dislike, we are avoiding ALL peanuts and nuts. I had "glued" together the acorns with PB  for this lunch. If I were to do this again I would use honey or soynut butter to use as "glue" and would use chocolate soynut butter instead of Nutella for the tail to make this completely peanut free and tree nut free :)

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Oak Tree

In the spirit of welcoming Fall weather I made Eliana this Oak tree lunch :)

To make this Oak Tree Lunch I started with the trunk first. The tree trunk is a jelly sandwich.  I made one side of the sandwich with the crust to make it look more like a tree. The leaves of the tree are red, yellow, orange bell peppers and sun dried basil tortillas cut with an oak leaf mini cookie cutter.  I put pomegranate seeds as "falling acorns".

The pumpkins by the tree are cheese slices cut with mini cookie cutters. I drew the details on with food safe markers.

So simple to make!!

Eliana loved this lunch and ate everything :) I wasn't the happiest with the tree at first but when it was done I loved it.  But more importantly Eliana loved it and then proceeded to show me the one tree in the backyard that has colorful leaves :) 

Happy Fall everyone!

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